Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Since the story was not related in Latin until very late, it was not included in early European collections of Aesop's fables. Neo-Latin poems based on it were written in the 16th century, while in Italy it was included in Machiavelli’s earliest and least known fictional work Favola Cinica (1503). Most of these followed the fable's original Greek source in giving it the moral that acquaintance overcomes fear. When it appeared in Machiavelli’s prose, however, it was an illustration of how difficult things become easy with practice. 

Although the proverb 'Familiarity breeds contempt' hardly fits the story as it stands, William Blake made it do so in earliest versions of The Little Girl Lost from his Songs of Innocence and Experience . In it the wolf criticizes the scorpion's cold behavior towards Lyca and is thrown into the river to teach the arachnid better manners. Scholars propose Blake later revised those verses, removing them from the published work entirely due to too a brutal shift in narrative, posing too much attention on the wolf and the scorpion’s discordant relationship, inciting nature’s conflict with  itself around Lyca’s presence which would thus misguide the prose of transitioning the themes of innocence towards experience. Blake, as a romantic writer, often utilized the elements of nature as one full conscient entity. Never as composite pieces of raging internal interests interlocking in a web of complex hierarchies transported into antagonistic nigh nonsensical desirous impulses.

To suggest his first iteration of the prose could have moved in the direction of the absurd impulses predetermined by the family’s curse lest Blake’s editor — patently not an Addams — not intervened became, for a few moments, far more than it could be possible for her to bear.

With a noise of disgust, Wednesday closed the tome with such curtness Thing had to dodge out of the way from his position as page-turner, quickly fleeing as to preserve his manicured cuticles from his charge’s rage. Her penmanship scattered everywhere as her annotations fell into lazy circles around her.

“Ridiculous.” She muttered, rubbing her eyes tiredly, prodding at the resurfacing headache with the accustomed effort of a faster donning their cilice: torturous, piteous but ultimately non-fatal. 

Fucking unfortunate.

 “Thing.”

The hand perked its wrist from behind a stack of books, not fully comfortable that his precious manicure wouldn’t be ruined by his master’s strained patience.

“With me, we’re leaving.” The family library had outlived its usefulness on the subject. With an uncharacteristic twist in her stomach, a scratch behind the sinuous muscles of her vocal chords she couldn’t properly rid of and breath pattern constituting one among the living Wednesday knew herself to be outwardly agitated as she felt inside. This desperation would not do. It must be eliminated, once and for all. Confronted right to its source. A problematic venture.

Thing signed in confusion, how a mutilated hand could have the airs to be brow furrowing was another (albeit inconsequential) mystery of the Addams supernatural and magical phenomena she’d have yet to uncover.

“I’ll have to arm myself with what knowledge I already have. If not even the greatest writing minds of our clan could be dissuaded from their impulses on such an advanced stage, sheer willpower will have to suffice.”

Wednesday could somehow feel Thing rolling his nonexistent eyes at her, signing a different wildly unacceptable approach to the whole conundrum.

“Repeat that to me again and I will make molotov cocktails out of all your hand care products and use them on you as target practice.”

Thing scampered away from her soon after. 

Wednesday sighed, slumping against the library’s door dejectedly. If Enid’s condition couldn’t be tempered and Wednesday’s curse could not be methodically gauged, all that was left to do was plan for the worst.

The ball would occur at the Addam’s mansion that evening and if her parents had any sense they’d begin preparations for her impending funeral the following day. Her blood pressure hardy as it was, certainly wasn’t made to withstand the full Guantanamo torture to her frontal lobe that would be Enid Sinclair wearing a gown to Wednesday’s Sabre Mazurka. During the wolf’s heat, with her scent mingling with hers and of her family. Enid’s scent inside her home, inside her room, among Wednesday’s personal sabre collection, her knives and dear Lilith her guillotine collection. It would all smell of Enid.

She more heard the groan of the enormous double doors of the library protesting against the violent thunk! of her forehead against the mahogany rather than pay any mind to the summation of headaches she was accumulating by this point. Her pain now wouldn’t compare to the one of a kind first of its name unwelcome torture of perceiving her first friend as uncontrollable fuel for her inherited curse. Any and all discomforts now would not matter, as long as Wednesday found a way to withstand the whole of this evening — facts, chances, statistics, luck and any matter of bets staggeringly against her favor at this juncture — she could perhaps maintain the one smattering of colors she could tolerate in her life. Like a precarious kaleidoscopic rainbow post a vindictive storm, tonight and all subsequent days until the end of her perishable existence, Wednesday would protect Enid from this singular aspect of her sinister nature.

Determined, Wednesday extracted herself from the gloomy shaped hole she made against the doors with her incessant head banging and tore out the hallway like a woman possessed. Her first order of business: to modify her ceremonial clothes for tonight.

With the impending doom of Enid’s singular attention held towards her, Wednesday would rather swallow a dozen of Pugsley’s hand grenades than dance the Mazurka in white pants , traditional as it may be and one of the only times she would allow a light shade to grace her skin.

Nevermind her delirious thoughts of rubbing herself against all of her best friend’s clothes and bedding articles. She wasn’t a werewolf, there was no justification for any bout of scenting possessiveness on her part, unless…

Wednesday’s shoes screeched to a halt through the immaculate polished hardwood floor.

She’d have to ask her parents. 

Performing a complete one eighty, she changed her trajectory to hunt her father down. Better Gomez than her mother. Morticia’d know immediately. But if she asked casually over one of their father-daughter bouts, he’d be none the wiser. Yes.

It was decided: genealogical bloodline inquiries first, alteration to her garments second and masturbation last. 

She’d need all her mental faculties for her Mazurka. And with the upcoming blood moon? Now more than ever.

Chapter Text

In futurity

I prophesy

That the earth from sleep

(Grave the sentence deep)

Shall arise, and seek

Enid couldn’t quite contain the low rumble leaving her chest, the outpouring of promised violence wasted on empty air, with only the bloodied carcass of her hunt to witness her wrath.

Licking her chops and shaking her fur off of excess blood she tore off a final piece of raw venison to swallow in one bite. The good parts were already devoured, at this point the wolf was just containing its need to sink teeth into flesh. Living flesh. Addams flesh.

Drooling crimson and claws extended to paw at the dirt beneath her, Enid reminded them both they didn’t want to leave any more obvious trails, especially not so close to their territory. Moon and blooddrunk as she was, she wasn’t crazy enough to invade a witch’s property with a death count for trespassing. All of the land was Morticia’s, its animals included. Even more so the flesh of her own daughter.

She’d bide her time. Make a proper entrance, follow the rules. Of her clan and the Addamses. 

Someone in this courtship had to have manners after all, and if not her intended…

Well.

Opening wide, the silver wolf’s maw grabbed the dead deer by the neck, dragging it further outside of Hell Mountain’s outskirts. Better bury it somewhere the Addams wouldn’t occur to wander.

Enid wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise.

Howling to the moon, the wolf agreed.

Well, not too much.

Chapter Text

For her maker (made) meek

In truth, the stakes weren’t always as high until the fortnight prior to Wednesday’s coming of age ceremony.

It was the middle of the semester but everything was already arranged for her official leave of absence once her parents sent letters to make the faculty aware of their traditions and steps Wednesday would take to not fall behind in her studies, a matter that was truly more formality than anything since her records previous to Nevermore had always been spotless, and she hadn’t had a single blemish on her current supernatural curriculum — her penchant for trouble out of bounds of the school notwithstanding.

The matter wasn’t really kept in secrecy either since, distressful as she made the ordeal be, she had become quite good at friendship and maintaining her social bonds. A far cry from her roommate’s social butterfly tendencies to be sure but, really, nothing could quite compare to the fierce posturing and camaraderie of werewolves. 

Not that her father wouldn’t give Enid a run for her money in that regard.

But even so, she had made sure she told her friends — plural — that she’d be traveling back home for a while to take on a more particular kind of exam, that she’d take her midterms a bit late and that under no circumstances — and at this Wednesday glared something fierce at both her roommate and her respective vampire menace — she wanted a farewell party since her flight back was already scheduled to begin with. She wouldn’t be gone long enough to be missed, it would be a two to three week ordeal and then she’d be back to harass everyone like nothing ever was out of place.

Planning accordingly for the emotional onslaught she knew her friends would make of it, keeping Enid in mind as being the biggest factor, she thought she had devised a good enough plan to keep them all at bay and mollified about her absence. She had read about pets suffering separation anxiety and figured there was no reason her human(oid) peers wouldn’t behave similarly. 

Enid and Yoko had pouted and pleaded to no avail with the heart shattering news of being prohibited from throwing any kind of rager on Wednesday’s behalf, be it a birthday party or farewell festivities. The girls were only marginally reasonable about the whole prospect once she had unveiled that they would each receive a present of sorts, to remember her by, but more accurately to buy their complacence.

Wednesday had always hated goodbyes ever since she was six. She loathed to make this detour any more conflicting and bittersweet than she was willing to admit it was.

“I’ll take the bribe.” Bianca said smartly, with not quite innocence in her smirk. “Honestly all you had to do is tell us to eff off and we’d leave you alone with your puppy. But, you know what they say about gifted horses.”

They had all become closer through the years, initial personality clashes and misunderstandings smoothed over with time and overall geographic proximity. The whole group shared dorms, cafeterias, classes and social events together. Even if there wasn’t necessarily the certainty of camaraderie, hate was not truly an option no matter how naively Wednesday thought she could steer clear of relationships. Of caring for others. Of making concessions, reasoning, sacrificing her ego in the name of something greater than herself. 

Friendship. 

Such a menial word that didn’t hold the true emotionality nor the hard work she had to put in to achieve these bonds she now had. She could say now (upon pain of death still, because some things didn’t fully change) that she loved her friends. Truly. 

She did not have to wonder what the younger version of herself would think of her, could she see herself down the line of the years. She’d scoff at her future self, call her soft and insane beyond reckoning, that it all was a waste of resources and time. In all honesty it was simply a relief to be truly let go of the weight she had carried. And now she had a few sets of shoulders to help her share burdens. Her younger self be damned, she'd work smarter not harder; this was the greater improvement.

Looking at her circle of friends sitting at the lunch table, she knew that they could all depend on each other should the need arise and even if it didn’t: they’d still be there.

Alas, none of that would stop Sinclair to reach for Bianca’s posturing and meet her all the way. None of them were very good at backing down, and the offcuff comments about the wolf and the raven’s proximity intensified along the years; mainly because Bianca was patently a bitch, Wednesday a brat and Enid a bully hater. And the roommates in question would always refuse to acknowledge the siren’s logic when she was behaving this ridiculously and beyond sanity.

So, naturally as it had grown to be during the last few months, before a row could conceivably take place between Barclay and Enid, Wednesday shoe-horned an interruption, this time by announcing their gifts one by one.

“Some of them are already in your rooms, I’ve arranged for Thing to be placing them there while we’re having lunch.” That got a reaction out of everyone and took Bianca entirely by surprise — by design — which stopped her queen bee persona dead in her tracks. 

“What the fuck Addams.” 

Wednesday gave her a what can you do shoulder raise. “Some of the items are more cumbersome in nature than others.” Disaffected by the siren’s affront, she continued. “You’ll find yourself perfectly well compensated Barclay, you have practice right after lunch, correct?”

Bianca narrowed her deep-sea eyes. 

“We have practice Addams and what does this even—” She paused. “ You got me a rapier?!”

“Coach agreed to cancel my participation until my return once I proved missing two weeks of lessons would not impact on my form.” Wednesday said, irritatingly dodging the bigger one of Bianca’s questions. 

“I trust you’ll find your incentive to my absence quite satisfactory once you test it out today.” 

Sighing in exasperation, Enid settled back down to Wednesday’s side, legs brushing over their skirts. 

“You know you can call them gifts, right?”

“They are no such thing.” She insisted.

“Right.”

“Is the saber even FIE approved, Wednesday?” Bianca swerved the conversation back to topic, smartly avoiding a bickering round between the two roommates. And starting one of her own.

Unaware of the stink-eye Enid was giving the siren, Wednesday took the bait and advanced, “It would be disrespectful to give one favor with duplicitous intent.”

“You had no trouble doing that before.” Barclay parried.

“You were worthy of offense before.” Wednesday riposted.

Score.

Bianca smiled then, coy as a great white smelling blood, all teeth and blue eyes, “Thank you. For the gift.”

Wednesday huffed in avertissement , grunting so impressively it reminded Enid of a wolf voluntarily submitting to its equal.

Score.

“Anyway,” said Yoko maneuvering them out of the tied bout. “What’s in the box?” Hopeful she could subtly adjourn the whole pissing contest to at least after lunch. She’d like some peace and quiet to enjoy her O- Capri Sun thank you very much.

As if on cue, Wednesday slid the 16 by 10 by 7 ornamented leather monstrosity of a carry-on her way. More than a bit puzzled, Yoko undid the buckles securing the lid closed and upon inspecting the contents inside, her jaw promptly hit the floor and she was left gaping at a selection of six vintage reds from—

“Tuscany,” Wednesday supplied. “My father has dealings with a coven near Montepulciano, their castle grounds are home to a vineyard known for macerating their grapes with virginal blood, I admit the full process eludes me, but my father was able to procure six bottles on my behalf—”

“Wednesday.” Yoko interrupted back, a rabid look on her face. “Palazzo V. and its family haven’t produced new bottles since—”

“The Vampire Epidemic, yes I’m well aware.” 

“Each bottle sells for at least 900 thousand euros and you’re telling me you went and got six!!! Six 1735—”

“1725 actually—”

“No way, fuck you! Six, 1725 vintage reds from the most prestigious vampire winemakers in history and you give them as a ‘see you soon’ gift?!”

Enid heard that surprisingly expert submissive growl from her roommate again, “ Not a gift—”

“I wouldn’t even expect these for my funeral!”

Wednesday glowered. “That can be arranged.”

“Bitch, I’m gonna need you to stop with the murder looks for a sec, because I’m literally going to become a wine aunt and that’s your fault!” Yoko practically vaulted from her side of the table and gave Wednesday the quickest hug she could before dodging an elbow to the ribs.

Rummaging for the perfect bottle to pull out, Bianca promptly threw out the contents of her and Wednesday’s plastic lunch cups so Yoko could pour two fingers for each of them. 

Wednesday made a face. “That’s where you’re choosing to air your wine on?” To immediately be stunned by Barclay and Tanaka throwing back the red like cheap vodka.

Enid had very limited time to react to her roomie launching herself full body at her friends for ill-practiced wine table manners which resulted in, for the moment, forgetting all about questioning what was her ‘see you soon’ parting gift.

Chapter Text

And the desart wild,
Become a garden mild.

Despite Wednesday’s obvious genius in nigh anything she dedicated her mind to — and perhaps because of it — even now years after their first meeting, so close to graduation, being the closest to understanding the blonde implicitly even before she spoke a single word, Enid can tell her roommate hasn’t fully figured her out. Not completely. 

Considering the whole of Wednesday, it made sense. Enid had caught glimpses of the Addams relationship with her family, the parents and younger brother being nothing but absolutely charismatic and pleasant towards her in passing. Morticia was all smiles with high angles but soft curves, tight dresses in dark colors, precise circular motions and body language of someone used to holding the attention of others for long periods either by chance or force. She smelled of the carnivore flowers she described Enid she tended to in her gardens; of winter rains when the ground is in that middle state between freezing and muddy and beneath all that less the smell and more the impression of a swirling cauldron brewing atop a crackling fire, inviting you off the forest of her scent, out of the wintery demeanor of her smile and eyes and into the warmth embrace of a potion being brewed and the center of her hearth. 

To get to know Morticia was unexpectedly easy. All she had to do was to surrender autonomy of her wolf senses and accept the environment the Addams would plunge her into, with all of herself she’d be willing to give.

Enid quickly understood why Gomez seemed to act like a fly adoringly batting around the web that would bring the monster close. Mrs. Addams was simply being herself, and he worshiped at her altar implicitly.

It was a bit funny to be fair, with a mother so charismatic and a father so obviously besotted with both women in his life, Wednesday would turn out such a sour puss. Gomez imparted his wife and daughter with such love and devotion she was surprised to find his scent wasn’t sweet and coiling but earthy with hints of iron. She would later find out that Mr. Addams perpetual state was bleeding (in any capacity). Whether it be by the hand of his youngest and his bear traps, his wife with their married affairs (TMI thanks) or because his daughter stabbed him with the unprotected foil of a rapier during one of their seemingly recurrent sparring sessions. And most brilliantly he took it all in stride, his wide body stomping ground for what he liked to call his family’s love bites. If his wife was a suffocating hypnotic force, Gomez could be easily attributed to be as expansive as a land-tremor, forcing people together with the sheer amount of his grand nature and ever present generosity. He took pride in his family and took care of his own, going as far as to consider Enid a member of his. She was surprised to find he was not a wolf himself.

The younger brother she had yet to meet, having to rely on accounts of Wednesday of how much of a pest he could be (she could relate, werewolves had big families and the younger pups tended to be a bit of menaces) and how gullible. Her roommate claimed she could and previously had convinced him to step into a freshly dug grave of his own making, and sat very still for the live burial proceedings all because she had goaded him into thinking being six feet under he’d be able to smell fresh strawberries. 

Upon commenting that her older brothers did that once with her but using a body of water instead, Wednesday proofread it as a positive sign her and Pugsley would get along well.

Enid liked to think it was because unlike her sister, the younger brother was not a serial killer in the making. But what did she know?

All things considered it made sense Wednesday never had to tame herself an ounce since being born. She had loving, accepting parents who taught her faith in herself above all else and a big widespread family that seemed to come from all walks of life — if her recountings of her cousin It marriage were anything to go by — so normality as a concept flew right past her braided head growing up. And despite the Addams clan being made up of so many different genealogies of the supernatural, Wednesday didn’t seem to fully inherit a single specific trait outside of being clearly brought up by witches.

“But you’re psychic?” Enid questioned once, during their studies for SB101 years ago.

“Witches are attuned to a wild variety of natural elements as you are well aware.” She didn’t seem offended, rather that was probably the first time she witnessed Wednesday providing forth helpful information about herself. Maybe she had been asked that before. “The spirit or aura is one such natural element. Anything sentient has one and any objects extensively handled by any one sentient being, imparts a small imprint of their spirit towards said object, making it possible to track, read and overall utilize it in spells. Separated organic compounds, such as hair, nails or tears, have traces of spirit and intent of the body that left it and a particularly powerful witch could read emotionality, causality and intent of the original being towards a goal using trace amounts of those separated organic compounds.”

“So it’s like supernatural CSI?” The wolf questioned, quirking her head to the side, exposing her long pale neck to the glittering light of the waxing gibbous during that night.

Wednesday took a second longer to answer and when she did, her voice was… off, a bit airy maybe. “Quite.”

She cleared her throat before continuing, the sound echoing in the spacious library around them. With very few students around past dining hours they had essentially the run of the place. As the old centerpiece grandfather clock ticked away the minutes of the eighth hour, shadows hitting the high angles of the gothic architecture and the natural lights of the floor to ceiling windows cast them in pale glow, Wednesday wondered not for the first time if all the moon blessed looked as empyreal so close to the full moon as Enid did.

“Xavier and other Psychics often have a deeper connection with theirs and others’ spirits; I’ve read articles portraying a Psychic’s brain MRI scan to illuminate the specific areas correlated to temporality and empathy, which confirms the cultural aspect to what we commonly call premonitions.”

“Huh, that’s cool.” Enid mumbled, palm rested on her chin having propped herself closer to Wednesday to listen, while nibbling the cap of her pen. A glint of fang appearing and disappearing behind pink lips. “But not a witch’s?”

“No.” Wednesday replied distantly, looking at the blonde’s face but perhaps not precisely her eyes. “Contrary to them, being a witch has little to do with genetics. Oftentimes it has even less to do with formal academia, although the concept of apprenticeship is widely utilized by a myriad of clans. Witchcraft simply is , and therefore to the young witch, so are we.”

Enid’s lips frowned in a question.

“Are what? Wends, what are you looking at?”

Wednesday jolted as if electrocuted, head snapping directly to blue eyes illuminated like jewels, framed by hair so blonde and fair under moon and electric light it sat atop Enid’s head like a ghost, her pale skin contrasting with the pink of her mouth, plump and full and still balancing the pen-cap between lips to speak.

Irritated, Wednesday plucked the cap from her roommate’s mouth. “Don’t call me that.”

“Sorry, hey!” Flouncing between apologetic and immediately affronted. “Give it back, my gel pen’s gonna dry!”

“You were barely using it for its intended purposes.” She admonished, un-pocketing an honest to god monogrammed handkerchief to clean the cap’s saliva with. “Do you not have more appropriate chew toys amongst your collection?”

The jab wasn’t unexpected. Being likened to a dog; no new taunt under the sun. They hadn’t known each other long, had just become roommates five months prior, this was their first real interaction outside of classes. By all accounts it was simply a way for the Addams to show Enid she considered her one of the homo-sapiens and was utilizing the attempt at offense as some sort of how do you do repartee.  It was low hanging fruit. 

Enid smiled, showing fang and dimple. She could make it go lower.

“No…not anymore.” She scooted her chair closer, as if vying to tell a secret, both hands resting under her chin, dimpled smile still in place. 

Wednesday’s dark eyes narrowed suspiciously but otherwise didn’t intervene.

“I had one, his name was Ajax but we split a while back.” Enid pretends to be overtly despondent relaying the events. “He took it as good as he could but not everyone can take a wolf y’know?”  She showed her claws, just to be an ass. “We play hard.”

Using her un-clawed dominant hand she swiped her cap back from Wednesday’s distracted hands and recapped her pen with a finality reserved for mathematicians solving problems or district attorneys presenting their case to court. After which she proceeded to put the capped pen back to her mouth and chew away satisfyingly proclaiming: “Leave my stimming habits alone, roomie!”

If ever asked, Wednesday would proclaim the flush crawling up her neck was a result of her tightening her tie too strongly that day before school functions.